'The Land of the Living' review — Juliet Stevenson gives a powerhouse performance in this resonant World War Two drama

Read our review of David Lan's new play The Land of the Living, now in performances at the National Theatre to 1 November.

Summary

• David Lan's new play revisits a dark chapter of history from the end of the Second World War
• Juliet Stevenson stars as young UN aid worker Ruth in Stephen Daldry's production
• The show makes an important plea for good people to do something when faced with evil

This detailed new play from former Young Vic artistic director David Lan shines a light on a particularly dark episode of World War Two, namely the stealing of children from Eastern Europe by the Nazis in order to replenish their depleted "Aryan" stock.

Juliet Stevenson gives a powerhouse performance as Ruth, a journalist and relief worker who leads the campaign to identify and return the "special children", as they are euphemistically labelled by the Germans, who literally measured them for suitability. The drama opens at her house in 1990 London, where she's visited by Thomas (Tom Wlaschiha), one of the boys she rescued. He wants to know the truth of what happened, and so we're transported back to 1945 Bavaria where the story unfolds.

Stephen Daldry's production, one of the last in the Dorfman under the Rufus Norris regime, plays out on a vast traverse stage designed by Miriam Buether, bookended by Ruth's kitchen at one end and a library with piano at the other (it turns out Thomas is a talented musician). The action tends to come in jolts, with long scenes often jarred by sudden action or violence. Artie Wilkinson-Hunt (on press night) gives a superb performance as the child Thomas, who's initially furious about being taken from his German adopters but grows increasingly attached to Ruth, as she works to discover his country of origin.

There's strong support too from Kate Duchêne as Dora, Ruth's matronly colleague, Michael Fox's American GI George, who dubs the women the "bleeding heart brigade", and Michael Marcus as Bill, the photographer who will become her husband. The multi-lingual ensemble variously become grieving parents, soldiers, villagers and myriad others caught up in the nightmare that was postwar Germany. But perhaps most heartbreaking of all is the representation of a child as a small shirt, unfolded from a suitcase, as she's reunited with her father in Poland after being smuggled out by train.

At nearly three hours, it's long and somewhat stodgy, Lan's script tending to feel at points like an exposition-heavy history lesson, particularly in the early scenes. It could do with tightening to focus the story more on Ruth's dynamic with Thomas, which feels fuzzy as it flashes back and forward in time. His revelation towards the end, which I won't spoil, feels a little too convenient and doesn't quite bring the catharsis the drama requires. However, there are interesting questions raised particularly regarding the motivations of Ruth, whose Schindler-like mission is tempered by her tendency for self-promotion (she quotes newspaper articles about herself and poses for magazine profiles).

It's a real treat to see Stevenson in such an epic central role – she's on stage for nearly the duration – and she effortlessly holds the focus. Her scenes with Wilkinson-Hunt are especially moving as she shows him both maternal protection but also the respect these children were denied during the war (against the mores of the time she allows his frequent violent rages to play out, and even joins in with them at one point). As is often the case in such dramas, focussing in on one child's story serves to highlight the horror that so many were involved.

Lan is a director and writer with a long track record of highlighting repressions and injustices. Here he has hit upon a story, based largely on interviews with late journalist Gitta Sereny, upon whom Ruth is apparently based, that speaks to a present climate when migration is a hot topic and far-right ideas are on the rise (in Brecht's words as Arturo Ui, "The bitch that bore him is in heat again"). It's easy to feel numb to genocidal horrors but Lan humanises them and shows that intervention, however difficult the consequences may end up becoming, is always the right answer. In the end it's a plea and a defence of good people doing something, and that's a message we all need to heed.

The Land of the Living is at the National Theatre to 1 November.

Photo credit: The Land of the Living (Photos by Manuel Harlan)